In a note to the City this morning, the fashion retailer confirmed the appointment of KPMG advisers after a story appeared over the weekend in the Sunday Times. In the update, Joules said it currently had net debt of £21.4m, giving £11.3m headroom within its banking facilities, in line with the Board’s expectations.

“Whilst the Group continues to manage its cash resources carefully over its seasonal borrowing peak, it expects to have sufficient liquidity to manage its working capital requirements over this time,” it added. 

Joules said it had made “good progress” on initiatives designed to ease the financial pressure, including focusing on fewer, more profitable wholesale accounts and improving and simplifying the Group’s end-to-end product process to reduce costs and shorten lead times.